Evidentiary value preservation in accordance with TR ESOR

Document archiving changesThe specifications for
the long-term archiving of digital items have changed in recent years and
present business and authorities alike with new tasks. Because of legal regulations,
ordinances and compliance requirements, companies must archive large quantities
of documents and preserve their evidentiary value for decades. Heretofore, this
was mostly achieved using paper-based archives. Although electronic archiving
is considerably more cost-efficient, the requirement of having to prove the
integrity and authenticity of a document often prevents the abolition of said
paper archives. With the
Technical Guideline on Preservation of Evidentiary Value for Cryptographically
Signed Documents (TR ESOR) worked out by the BSI, there now exists a guide
which describes how electronically signed data and documents can be reliably
saved for long periods of time – up to the end of the required retention
periods.

New technological requirements The electronic
protection methods must therefore be reliable and legally robust, capable of
being easily integrated into existing structures as well as, ideally, not
requiring any special knowledge of the underlying technologies. In addition,
migration-capable data should be created, which supplement the audit-proof
process and thereby allows simple transfer to other systems or new storage
technologies in a way that complies with the legislation in place.